ISLAMABAD: Special teams will start checking the security measures suggested by the city police to educational institutions after the extended winter vacation ends on January 11, officials said on Wednesday.

Assistant Inspector General (Operations) Dr Sultan Azam Temuri told a meeting of the heads of institutions and related federal departments that security drills should be held every month for “continuously reviewing” the measures.

Orders had gone out to the 422 schools, colleges and universities of Islamabad in the aftermath of the carnage of schoolchildren in Peshawar, to install CCTV in their premises and ring them with eight-foot high boundary walls, beside other security measures.

AIG Temuri said his colleague; AIG (Special Branch) Waqar Chauhan will personally conduct, what he called, the ‘security audit’ of the educational institutions, and urged the institutions to cooperate in the exercise.

A Security Audit Proforma has already been sent to the administrators of all educational institutions of Islamabad to be completed before they resume academic activities on January 12.

All these institutions were surveyed in the wake of Peshawar tragedy in order to enhance their security and the Chief Commissioner of Islamabad constituted a committee under AIG Chauhan, with people from Deputy Commissioner’s Office, Traffic and Operations Division of Police, the Federal Directorate of Education and the Private Education Institutions Regulatory Authority as members.

That committee has now formed five teams for carrying out the Security Audit.

Police sources said the teams will allow only those schools to reopen whose security arrangements they find satisfactory. Others will face legal action for lacking proper security.

Published in Dawn, January 1st, 2015